STRIKE has about 250 defintions in the OED, coming in at #10 on a list that I came across (RUN is #1 with more than 600).
As usual, quite a variety of quality clues, so everybody gets a gold star/smiley face sticker (your choice).
But, to cut a long story short, it pretty quickly came down to two clues: jono 3 and fieryjack 6. Both have clever wordplay and smooth surfaces (not always easy to signal a first or last letter in a non-clunky way). So it really came down to which surface I preferred. Jono's was topical (though wouldn't the Labour leader
support laborers?) and could be a newspaper headline, but FJ's, to me, evoked an image of a struggling songwriter in Nashville who is waiting tables and going to open-mike nights doing covers of other people's songs, and one night a famous but alcoholic country music star stumbles into the bar and hears her sing and they go back to his place and he discovers that she writes her own songs and they're really good and she should perform her own material and they go on tour together and.... wait, this is just the plot of the Bradley Cooper/Lady Gaga version of "A Star is Born."
Anyhoo, I slightly preferred FJ's so he gets the gold:
Singer needs time for her first hit (6)
In reading a bit about the singer in the clue, I also learned far more about the feeding habits of the shrike than I really cared to know.
Congrats to FJ and thanks to all for contributing.
Prizes
Strikes of one sort or another:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TaPgSWdcYtY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b0M8Z37T36U
Music bonus:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NqvcVyv1r8k